Every day, customers are turning to social media to reach out to companies regarding their concerns and questions. This is a huge opportunity for companies and organizations to quickly respond and resolve an issue in real time. Whether it is through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, it is important to encourage your customers and clients to reach out to you over these platforms for instant response and gratification.
However, people tend to use Twitter more than any other social platform to reach out to companies because of the benefit of real time and instant replies from companies. Facebook and Instagram are more beneficial for leaving comments and questions on posts while a Twitter user can directly reach out to the company.
The simplicity of Twitter
Because of the simplicity of twitter, it highly encourages people to use this platform more than others when reaching out to companies. Instead of looking up the company’s email address and having to fill out a contact form, twitter users can simply tweet the company by “@” tagging them and writing their questions or comments. This twitter user was able to reach out to DirectTV regarding an issue and received a faster response than if she were to send an emai
Benefit of using Twitter for customer service
Since Twitter is a natural fit for customer service according to twitter.com, it allows your customers to easily ask questions. This is the best benefit in our opinion. However, since it is in real time, using twitter to interact with your customers and followers can have a direct benefit to your business.
So how do you do this?
1. Have a social media director or a group of employees in charge of your twitter accounts. Once they see a notification, have them reply as soon as possible. Don’t have anyone to look after your twitter account? We would love to at SimplySearch and help monitor your accounts. Contact us for more info!
2. Respond quickly! The main reason why they are reaching out to you via Twitter is because they desire instant replies.
3. According to twitter.com, when customers don’t receive an instant or quick reply 84% end up not recommending your company to others.
Keep the conversations short and light and move them from public to private
1. If a customer tweets you a request for directions to fix an issue. You can direct message (dm) the customer since private messages do not have a word limit
2. However if the issue is simple and less than the word limit, by all means publicly share the information so other customers can see the answer as well. This will help avoid the same questions being asked multiple times. So yay for shortcuts
3. Retweet any positive tweets about your business. This will help you expand positive awareness about your business to others. And who doesn’t want more attention?
4. If a customer wrote a fantastic tweet about your business, pin it to the top of your page so everyone can see. Be sure to also thank the customer for writing the tweet and let them know you are available if they need help in the future. It’s all about being there for your customers!
What if you don’t know how to help them right away?
So you set up your twitter and excited for customers to start reaching out to you via a tweet but they ask a question you can’t answer right away. What do you do? Just ignore them and move on to the next questions. NO! JUST KIDDING! Of course you still reply back to them with a message mentioning you are resolving the issue right away and will get back to them as soon as possible. Even if the issue can’t be solved in real time, at least the customer has instant relief that the issue is in the process of being resolved. Eliminate the reason for them to send an email and waiting impatiently for a response.
Add personality to your business
Perfect opportunity to add personality to your company. Corporate businesses tend to be tight and straightforward in resolving their issues. However, Twitter is a great tool to break this stereotype and have fun with your customers. Below is a great example showing how even though the customer did not receive the item he intended to purchase, Sainsbury’s instantly communicated with the customer in a comedic manner and contacted the store for the shelf to be re-stocked.
How to handle negative feedback on customer service
It’s going great. You followed all the above steps and your customers are reaching out to you with questions and concerns and you are banging them out the park with replies. But one customer was not so happy with either your product, service and left a not so pleasant tweet. Don’t panic it is not the end of the world! Always remain positive and turn any negative situation into a positive one. Here’s how:
1. Remember Twitter is a public platform so all of your followers, non-followers and customers can see the comments and questions being asked. As soon as a negative tweet is out there about your business, reply to the customer as soon as possible. This shows everyone that you are willing to make the situation better and help out the customer in any way instead of leaving them in the dark.
2. Acknowledge your mistakes. It’s always best to show transparency and work as hard as you can to fix the situation.
Tag the customer’s name in your response and use a conversational tone to let them know they are talking to a human and not a social media robot.
3. Try to clarify the reasoning behind the negative comment. Either do this via dm if you are worried about receiving more negative feedback or tweet them back if you are brave and want to make the conversation public. In this situation it is typically different in every case so use your best discretion.
Personalize your response and do not just send a generic response. People want to be cared for when they are upset and knowing the company is personally talking to them makes the situation a little bit brighter rather than if it was a generic message. Here is a great example of what NOT to do.
How NOT to reply to a customer who left a negative tweet about your business. Always personalize your response to their situation.
Don’t take it personally. Not everyone is going to happy with your product or service and that is okay! Still show them your love and the world will still be a better place.